Whether Out of Charity God Ought to Be Loved for Himself?
Objection 1: It would seem that God is loved out of charity, not for
Himself but for the sake of something else. For Gregory says in a
homily (In Evang. xi): "The soul learns from the things it knows, to
love those it knows not," where by things unknown he means the
intelligible and the Divine, and by things known he indicates the
objects of the senses. Therefore God is to be loved for the sake of
something else.
Obj. 2: Further, love follows knowledge. But God is known through
something else, according to Rom. 1:20: "The invisible things of God
are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made."
Therefore He is also loved on account of something else and not for
Himself.
Obj. 3: Further, "hope begets charity" as a gloss says on Matt. 1:1,
and "fear leads to charity," according to Augustine in his commentary
on the First Canonical Epistle of John (In prim. canon. Joan. Tract.
ix). Now hope looks forward to obtain something from God, while fear
shuns something which can be inflicted by God. Therefore it seems
that God is to be loved on account of some good we hope for, or some
evil to be feared. Therefore He is not to be loved for Himself.
_On the contrary,_ According to Augustine (De Doctr. Christ. i), to
enjoy is to cleave to something for its own sake. Now "God is to be
enjoyed" as he says in the same book. Therefore God is to be loved
for Himself.
_I answer that,_ The preposition "for" denotes a relation of
causality. Now there are four kinds of cause, viz., final, formal,
efficient, and material, to which a material disposition also is to
be reduced, though it is not a cause simply but relatively. According
to these four different causes one thing is said to be loved for
another. In respect of the final cause, we love medicine, for
instance, for health; in respect of the formal cause, we love a man
for his virtue, because, to wit, by his virtue he is formally good
and therefore lovable; in respect of the efficient cause, we love
certain men because, for instance, they are the sons of such and such
a father; and in respect of the disposition which is reducible to the
genus of a material cause, we speak of loving something for that
which disposed us to love it, e.g. we love a man for the favors
received from him, although after we have begun to love our friend,
we no longer love him for his favors, but for his virtue.
Accordingly, as regards the first three ways, we love God, not for
anything else, but for Himself. For He is not directed to anything
else as to an end, but is Himself the last end of all things; nor
does He require to receive any form in order to be good, for His very
substance is His goodness, which is itself the exemplar of all other
good things; nor again does goodness accrue to Him from aught else,
but from Him to all other things. In the fourth way, however, He can
be loved for something else, because we are disposed by certain
things to advance in His love, for instance, by favors bestowed by
Him, by the rewards we hope to receive from Him, or even by the
punishments which we are minded to avoid through Him.
Reply Obj. 1: From the things it knows the soul learns to love what
it knows not, not as though the things it knows were the reason for
its loving things it knows not, through being the formal, final, or
efficient cause of this love, but because this knowledge disposes man
to love the unknown.
Reply Obj. 2: Knowledge of God is indeed acquired through other
things, but after He is known, He is no longer known through them,
but through Himself, according to John 4:42: "We now believe, not for
thy saying: for we ourselves have heard Him, and know that this is
indeed the Saviour of the world."
Reply Obj. 3: Hope and fear lead to charity by way of a certain
disposition, as was shown above (Q. 17, A. 8; Q. 19, AA. 4, 7, 10).
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